Various electrical connector assemblies include a pair of mating dielectric housings respectively mounting complementarily interengaging male and female terminals formed from sheet metal material. The terminals have terminating portions terminated to respective electrical conductors, and the female terminal has a receptacle portion for receiving the male terminal. In one type of such electrical connector assembly, the receptacle portion of the female terminal is generally rectangularly shaped, with a top wall, a bottom wall and a pair of short side walls for receiving a flat male blade terminal. The top wall or the bottom wall of the receptacle portion of the female terminal includes a locking tang for locking engagement in an opening in the flat male blade terminal to secure or lock the blade terminal against removal from the receptacle portion of the female terminal.
Usually, the female terminal is inserted into a passageway of a dielectric housing and is locked therewithin for receiving the male blade terminal. The passageway is generally rectangularly shaped in cross-section complementary to the rectangular shape of the receptacle portion of the female terminal. Either the top or bottom interior wall of the housing passageway has a cam surface or actuator for engaging a cam follower of the female terminal operatively associated with the locking tang. Relative movement between the housing and the female terminal, such as by pulling on the housing, is effective to pull the locking tang of the female terminal out of the opening in the male blade terminal to release the locking interengagement between the terminals.
One of the problems with electrical connector assemblies of the character described is that the rectangularly configured female terminal must be inserted into the complementarily rectangularly shaped passageway in the housing in only one orientation, in order to properly locate the locking components between the terminal and the housing as well as to properly orient the releasing cam actuator and locking tang of the terminal. This becomes increasingly difficult with the ever-increasing miniaturization of such electrical connectors and often requires an operator or user to use a trial-and-error procedure to determine which orientation of the terminal is proper to effect insertion into the housing. This invention is directed to solving these problems by providing an electrical connector assembly with a rectangularly shaped female terminal insertable into a rectangularly shaped passageway in a housing in either of two orientations, 180.degree. apart, and still have the connector perform the various functions described above. An operator, therefore, simply has to align the longer dimensions of the rectangular configurations.